


In The Water, Yeah, In The Water

by loosenyourcorset



Category: Tiny Meat Gang (Band), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Blood, Death, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, but if minor descriptions of an injury bother you then i wouldn't read it, i wouldn't say it's gory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:48:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23640352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loosenyourcorset/pseuds/loosenyourcorset
Summary: The very end ofL'appel du Vide, but mostly from Cody's perspective.(You don't necessarily need to read that one to understand this one.)
Relationships: Cody Ko & Noel Miller, Cody Ko/Noel Miller
Comments: 3
Kudos: 19





	In The Water, Yeah, In The Water

A minute, it turns out, can go very slowly. Cody had always moved very fast in life. From one activity to the next, to the next, to the next, over and over again through the years. Friends and family often struggled to keep up with him. Not physically, but in general. He had never noticed the minutes of his life prior to diving that day in the Outer Banks. When they say your life flashes before your eyes, it really kind of does.

So sue him: He made one little mistake.

Anybody's foot could have slipped on the exposed rock of the waterfall. It was wet, for god's sake. He had made the assumption that if Noel could do it, a man who'd never dived in his life, certainly a somewhat-seasoned pro could do it just fine. How wrong he was, he realized, as he fell into the water below.

It was not instantaneous, as some might think. He did not hit his head and _boom_ , lights out. It took a little bit. Long enough for him to think about what had happened. The rock had pierced the right side of his head and stunned him, taking away his ability to truly react. He knew that if he could get to the surface in time, he might have a shot at being okay. But his body simply would not do what he willed it to, no matter how hard he tried. The next sixty seconds happened slower than he would have expected. He'd been living in the water for the past few years, it seemed like, and he always thought that if he drowned it would happen so quick. He tried hard to gain the motivation to swim back up to surface level.

Revisiting parts of his life in his mind's eye did not happen chronologically. It wasn't like re-experiencing his time on earth from birth up until now. It came (ironically) in waves, albeit randomly. He saw his mother on his first day of college. _"My handsome boy!"_ she had proclaimed while he flinched away as she tried to smooth down his gelled hair, his father next to her and beaming with pride, telling him not to knock any young women up or he'd come down to Duke and strangle him. He saw his sister's seventh birthday party, watching his own hands push her little face into the icing of her sheet cake and laughing as she shouted at him. Next, the very first girl he'd ever kissed at a high school party, pressed up against one another in some tiny bathroom with fixtures he couldn't quite remember.

And then, Noel.

He was losing oxygen and any second now he was going to pass out. He wondered if Noel was close enough to get to him in time. If he was a good enough swimmer to dive beneath the water and pull Cody, who was marginally heavier, up to safety. If he would even try at all. If he cared about him enough. When those critical thoughts left him, his brain replayed _Noel_ to him.

The way Noel's smooth fingertips glided across his skin one night, dipping between his legs and avoiding what Cody wanted him to touch the most. The way it made Noel laugh, though not bitterly, when Cody had whined about it. The way Noel laughed period. How Noel had broken down one drunken morning at 3 a.m. and cried to him about his family - his siblings, his parents, the people both depending on and rooting for him - letting Cody hold him in his bed and rub his back softly. How Noel hadn't remembered it when they woke up hours later, or at least pretended not to. How Noel had never once said his last name, but had proven one time that he had memorized how to spell it. How Cody realized one day that he loved Noel, sitting at the cafe that Noel worked at, watching him make a cup of sugar with some coffee on the side. How he suddenly figured out that he may never get to say it to him. "I love you," he said to himself, losing a little of his held breath when he did. It was worth it, he decided.

His mind skipped to getting ice cream at some stand on the side of the road with his uncle on a family vacation to Seattle, and then to filling out his application for Duke. How he'd applied to other schools but secretly didn't care because that was the one he wanted to go to and he knew it. How his mom had originally cried when he said how far away he would be when he moved into his dorm.

He recalled the first movie he ever watched in a theater _(Men in Black)_ , the first time he ever failed an English test, the first time he ever tasted grits. The thought made him smile. He was gonna miss grits, and movies. Not so much the English tests, though.

His first job, his first bad haircut, his first driving lesson.

It all played through his head like a film with bad sequencing. He had that thought, and the one that followed was about goodbyes. His mom, dad, and sister. His extended family in Ottawa that he rarely got to see due to distance. His favorite uncle down in Winnipeg. The friends he'd made in middle school, high school, and now university. His best friend attending UCLA. Noel. He'd never get to say how much he loved them all, how much he would miss them too.

_"Do you think there's a heaven?" Cody asked Noel one day, totally out of the blue, as they sat in a secluded corner of the library studying APL. He'd been staring off into space for about three minutes, so Noel knew his mind had wandered off._

_"Dude, I don't know. My parents have a lot of faith in the idea of 'el cielo'. I've never given it much thought. Why?"_

_Cody shrugged. "Just wondering, I guess. Kinda freaks me out thinking that if I died right now or something, there is a good and bad outcome to that."_

_"You're like, the most good person I know. Annoying, yes. But annoying doesn't land you in hell. I don't think, anyway..." Noel had trailed off, Cody laughing absentmindedly as they got back to work._

The truth of it was, Cody's mind was so damn far from the thought of heaven right now. It lingered on bits and pieces of conversations from his past. Slices of his life dipped in and out of focus, weaving an incoherent story that would have made no sense had he not been the one to live through it all. He had been such a privileged person, he'd been given such a nice life. And he fucked it up by being insistent on jumping off of a cliff. Careless. Stupid. If he made it out of this he was never going to do another reckless thing as long as he lived, so help him god.

Cody had been blinking, trying to stay awake, but his eyes closed as his vision became blurry. He had no air left to hold onto. At this point, the rumors were true. It was almost peaceful. Almost serene. Quiet. His brain had been saving the best for last.

Noel's lips collided with his, forcing Cody to remember how warm and soft they were. His own hands slid around Noel's waist and pulled him closer. They were sweaty, their non-relationship having just been consummated for the first time ever. He had been so good at coaxing noises out of Noel. Who would do that for him now? Who would end up kissing that little spot that was so sensitive beneath his ear? Who'd get the privilege to wipe away his tears in the middle of the night, or, instead, moan his name? Cody didn't have time to dwell on that. His very last thought was registering Noel's hand in his, though he didn't realize that it was happening currently.

Noel was a moment too late. He tried to apply CPR to Cody on the beach, but all he knew of that was YouTube tutorials. Blood flowed over Noel's fingers as he held Cody's head on the sand, no longer pumping his chest or forcing his own breath into Cody's lungs. The last time he'd ever be alone with him, he knew, and he pressed a gentle kiss to his mouth and wiped away tears that were building up and threatening to fall at any second as a lifeguard called out to him from somewhere along the beach.  
_  
"Duerma bien."_

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QXQLOqpE_Y) song. Alternatively titled "60 Seconds" but I liked the lyric more.  
>   
> [tumblr](http://bitchthough.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 


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